


back with you

by armario



Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Kissing in the Rain, M/M, Scars, Trans Dick Grayson, Trans Male Character, these two just deserve to be happy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-06
Updated: 2016-08-06
Packaged: 2018-07-29 19:10:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7695961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/armario/pseuds/armario
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jason Todd and Dick Grayson have been apart for a while now. They miss each other.</p>
<p>They meet on a rooftop.</p>
            </blockquote>





	back with you

_Will you meet me? -D_

 

_yes_

 

_\--_

 

Sometimes, Dick just doesn't know what to do.

It's not that he doesn't _want_ to help- God, he wants it more than anything, wants this beatiful family of his to be happy. He can lie awake at night, staring empty eyed up at the ceiling wondering if he's missing something. Wondering if there _is_ something he can do- then accepting there isn't, and that's when the guilt sets in.

He can _always_ look on the bright side. Even when he was a child, terrified of who he was and how alien his body was becoming to him, and those awful days when everything seemed dark and hopeless- he still found the willpower to look into the night and smile at the stars, to allow himself the joy of flying, to take comfort from the love both families gave to him so readily.

The problem is, not everyone else can. That's his gift. Others don't share it.

“Jason,” says Dick, because he hasn't said that aloud for a while now, and it feels good to let the warmth and concern seep into his tone.

Jason does not look up. He rests his forearms on his thighs, watching Gotham's skyline glitter and glimmer with neon under the night's sky. He says nothing. Dick watches him swallow, watches his knuckles grow white where he's clenching his fists so tightly. Time seems to go on forever, and that's okay, but only if this is what Jason needs.

It isn't.

“I can't come back,” he tells the city. His voice is low and hoarse with disuse.

“You can.”

“I _can't,”_ snaps Jason, “because it won't be the same. I have no place any more.”

“You _always_ have a place here.”

“I don't think Bruce feels the same. He was quick enough to replace me.”

“He wasn't. He went off the _rails,_ Jay, you should have seen it. No, you shouldn't have. It would break your heart. It was-” Dick's voice catches. He takes a few steadying breaths. “I miss you,” he says simply.

“Do you know what I've done?”

Jason _sounds_ expressionless, but there's this note to his voice _and Dick didn't watch him grow up from a child to_  this _to not realise when he's breaking._

The next words Nightwing says will be crucial, especially to their relationship, and any hope of pulling Jason back from the edge. His first instinct is to go to him, but he risks making it worse.

“I know some things,” he answers carefully. “Not all of it.”

“Then that's why you're here, it must be. Because you don't know all of it. Because if you did, you wouldn't want to see me again. It's why Bruce isn't here.”

“ _No,”_ Dick says, frustrated. “I know enough. Bruce isn't here because he- he's so guilt blind he can't stand to even hear of you. That's why. He loves you so much. And so do I,” he says, raising his voice. “Nothing you could ever do would change that.”

Jason's whole body shudders and it takes a few seconds for Dick to realise that he is crying. Silent, shaky tears. Nightwing feels a lump in his throat and he makes the few steps between them to sit beside the other man and press close.

“Get away from me,” Jason says venomously. “Not a pity case.”

“I know, I know,” Dick whispers. He doesn't move, and Jason doesn't try to move him, nor fight when Dick slings an arm round his shoulders. They sit together, one so obviously trying to hold back tears, and the other trying to help.

“You can cry. It's alright. There's nothing wrong with it; it's good to cry. When I was- when I was a kid, the first few weeks after Bruce took me in- I cried, for the first time. I was so ashamed and so shocked with myself, to do that in front of someone else. Bruce told me it was okay, that everyone cries, and it didn't make me any less of a man to do it.”

Jason turns his head to rest against Dick's collarbone, breathing jumpy. “I missed you, too,” he grits out. He huffs. “God, you must be so out of your comfort zone,” he snorts.

Dick smiles wryly. He can't answer that; it's true, he isn't ever prepared for this. He tries his best, and gives as much love as anyone will accept.

“It's been so empty without you,” he says softly. “Everything. Always, there was something missing. I never stopped wishing it had been me.”

Jason can't find the words to reply.

“The joy- at finding you were still alive- it eclipsed anything else. You could have been- I don't know, fucking the Joker- and I still would have forgiven you for _anything_ just so long as you didn't leave me again.”

The Red Hood snickers. It feels good to laugh. He hasn't laughed in a long time, not genuinely, anyway.

He sobers up quickly, remembering the chaos before this moment. “I'm not the same anymore,” he mutters. “I've fucked up. _I'm_ fucked up. You can't bring _this-”_ he makes a derisive gesture towards himself- “back with you.”

He shivers, with cold and regret. “I can't go by a day without remembering everything. Every mistake I've ever made, every jolt of that fucking crowbar, every breath I missed below ground. And the bitterness, the hatred... I just can't shake it. I feel it now. You're here, for me, and my mind's going _but where was he when you were clawing your way out of a coffin? Where was he when you were being beaten and charred to dust?_ It's poisoning me.”

It's probably the most emotion Jason has ever let him see. Dick feels sick, twistedly honoured and so, so _sorry_ at the same time.

“In your life,” Dick murmurs, “you've been through so much. And that's incredible. You are incredible. I don't believe you'll stop fighting this. I want to help you.”

“When you fight, you feel something,” Jason answers. “You feel the need to keep going. You feel the instinct to live.

I don't feel anymore. I'm trying to learn, but the only emotion I can access is bitterness. It's all I've got. I just... I feel like I never came back to life.”

“Oh, _Jay,”_ Dick whispers. It's all he has left.

“I have scars from- from the autopsy.”

Dick breathes in sharply.

“When I see them, it's like they're- mocking me? Like they're telling me I'm still dead. I died, and that was the end of it.”

It starts to rain. Thick, cold droplets spatter over them. The view in front is a blur of lights and water pelting down onto the pavements hundreds of meters below. Jason shrugs off his jacket and drapes it over them both.

“Do you want to see them?” he asks quietly.

Dick's heart stops, for a second. He lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding, and gives a minute nod.

Jason lifts up his shirt, looking away. There, thick and pale pink, a y-shaped scar slashes the skin of his torso, amongst the backdrop of others less obvious.

Dick's mouth goes dry, and he finds it difficult to force his gaze away.

“They'll be there forever. Constant reminders.”

The younger man lets his shirt drop, still looking away.

Nightwing shivers, lets a few seconds go by to prepare himself, before he says, “I have some scars, too.”

Jason is watching him now.

“They're not- they're not as bad as yours. But they're... monumentous, to me. I have them because- well, I suppose I wanted them. They gave me freedom. Do you know what I'm talking about?”

“... No.”

Now that makes it harder. “If I show you, do you think you can guess?”

“I don't know. Maybe. Just tell me.”

Dick sighs. He copies Jason's earlier motion of lifting his shirt, exposing the two thick lines of scar tissue across his chest.

Jason's mouth drops open. Dick hopes this is in understanding.

"I never knew," the younger man murmurs.

"I never told you."

"And you didn't have to," Jason says. His voice drops. "So thank you."

Dick grins, and squeezes his shoulder.

His expression turns a little more solemn.

“I know this is a really tenuous link, but hear me out.

When I look at these, sometimes I feel resentful. I wish I didn't have them, because they mark me as different, and they remind me why I got them. But then I think of the alternative, and that is so much worse.

I taught myself to think of them as a mark of what I've been through. That their purpose is just to remind me that I was strong enough to survive them. 

Your alternative, Jaybird, is still being dead. Those scars show what you survived. You literally cheated death, man, they're incredible," Dick says, trying to keep the awe out of his voice. Jason's lip quirks. 

"I used to feel tied down to my old identity because my body didn't reflect my new one. The day I got these- when I had top surgery- when I felt that literal weight taken off my chest, I no longer felt tied down to the past. These scars are a reminder of that."

Jason is smiling now. It's rueful, almost sad, but a smile all the same.

"Do you see where I am going with this?" Dick asks softly, unable to keep a returning smile off his face. When Jason Todd smiles at you, you do not take it for granted.

Jason doesn't answer, even though he does see. He merely raises his eyebrows in invitation for Dick to continue.

"I think you should try to see your scars as a reminder of how strong you are. That they are only there to show you what you survived. That while they are products of the past, they should remind you that you are not tied down to it," Dick tells him. "When you said they were constant reminders- they are. Of how you  _survived death."_

The silent pause then is punctuated only by the rain that slicks its way into their hair and eyes and skin. The traffic below, rumbling smoke polluting the streets. 

"I don't deserve you," Jason says honestly, sad smile still in place.

"But you have me," Dick replies. 

"I wish I did," comes the answer, so quiet and so bitter that it is almost inaudible.

Dick frowns in confusion. "You-"

A sigh. "Shut up. Forget it."

A thousand thoughts race through Dick's head. Maybe he's reading this wrong, or overreacting, or hoping for something that isn't there.

"But-"

"I said  _shut up,"_ Jason snarls. To the unpractised ear, he sounds furious, but to Dick, he sounds terrified. "We've had our heart to heart, and that's the fucking end of it."

His hands are shaking. He twists away from Dick, snatching up his jacket as he goes. 

"Jay, I'm sorry," Dick says, scrabbling up to follow. "I didn't mean to upset you. I thought you were saying-" he trails off.

"Thought I was saying what?"

"That you..." He doesn't know how to finish that sentence. He feels as hopeless as he did before they started talking. 

"You thought wrong," Jason spits. "Arrogant bastard."

He turns, stalking away.

Dick is losing him. If he lets him go now, he'll never have another opportunity. He throws caution to the wind and follows, quickening his pace to catch up.

"Jason!" he shouts, and maybe it's just the lack of a nickname that makes the Red Hood stop, or maybe he was hoping for it.

Jason stops, and turns. Dick grabs him by the lapels of his jacket and kisses him, pleading to any god that will listen to make this work.

The younger man goes still, for about half a second, then kisses back as hard as he can, fingers tangling in the other man's hair. 

Dick makes a gentle sound of pleasure, mixed with surprise, mixed with a great deal of relief. 

"Wanted that since I first saw you," Jason murmurs against his mouth, voice wrecked. "God damn it."

"Jay," Dick gasps. He closes his eyes, leans against Jason and the barrage of emotions threatening him. "Thought I was losing you again."

"I'm sorry. Fuck, I'm sorry, Dick."

"Don't. Don't be sorry. Kiss me."

Jason tastes like cigarettes and the rain. Water mixes in rivulets on their skin. 

"Please come home," Dick begs.

Jason pulls back a little, panting, presses their foreheads together. This close, Dick can see the scattered colours of his eyes, the stubble on his face and the wet curl of a white streaked strand of hair. 

"Please."

Jason hand goes to trace Dick's scars through his shirt, briefly closing his eyes. It's a beautiful moment, charged with emotion. Two souls on a rooftop in the pouring rain, surrounded by a city they swore to protect, sharing only in each other.

"I'll come," he says. "I'll come home."

-


End file.
